Running in the Rain
Day 84- Regular Run- 6.67 Miles.
Day 85- Intervals/Strength- 11.09 Miles
Last night I got home from work around 8:30 pm. I had picked up some food and groceries on my way home so I laid them down on my kitchen table and the headed to my bedroom to change into some sweats. Once I changed and hung my clothes carefully in my closet, I made my way into the bathroom, washed my hands and my face and took my contacts out. I walked back into my bedroom, found my glasses on my desk, shut the lights and headed back into the kitchen. I unloaded the groceries and put things in their respective spots. Unwrapped the the tray of grilled chicken and brown rice I had picked up on the way home and poured myself a glass of water. My customary routine is I will typically turn on the Yankee game and try to read, eat and listen the game in the background, usually glancing up when I hear the crowd noise or the announcer’s voice change volume. That will typically lead to my eyes getting heavy, which leads me to brushing my teeth and heading to bed. I did not follow that routine last night. Instead I turned on the Presidential Debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. That upended my evening and my typical sleeping habits.
This is not a political rant. Watching the debate was kind of pointless for me since my intellect and preexisting left leaning politics would likely not have been swayed in any other direction. This was more the attraction of watching the spectacle of ignorance and frightening comedy of it. But it left me kind of wired because there was a palpable tension and the subsequent inexplicable discussion on whether there was a clear winner or loser in the debate. The problem with being wired on a Monday night for me is my speed work is scheduled for Tuesday mornings. As the clock clicked passed 11:00 pm, the network news came on and the weather man gave a preview for heavy rain in the morning. I shut off the television and looked at the forecast on my phone (in retrospect I guess I could have watched the weather report but that seemed pointless). The weather did look dicey but I shrugged and decided to go to bed and set the alarm for the usual 4:50 am. 4:50 am because that allows me one snooze for a wonderful ten minutes.
This morning the alarm blared and I angrily hit the snooze button. Ten minutes later I was once again woken by the alarm clock. I rose slowly from bed, walked toward the window and looked down towards the street. The street was glistening underneath the lamp post and the concrete was a darker version of gray. I made a noise as a stretched my arms upwards. I brewed my coffee, ate some gluten free oatmeal and scanned emails and headlines on my laptop. I thought about the rest of my day and then closed my laptop and started stripping off my clothes as I made my way to my closet. I changed into my shorts, my blue Nike singlet, slipped on my sneakers and headed outside. I walked outside underneath the awning in front of my building. There was a nice breeze in the air and I felt the drizzle of the rain. And that is where all the mundane stuff ends.
When I first started running, the rain was an automatic day off or time to head to the gym to run on the treadmill. That was my routine until one day I mentioned this to a guy I worked with named Timmy, who was a runner. Timmy responded to me and said “I kind of like running in the rain, it makes you feel like a badass.”
The first steps of a run in the rain are different because I feel the drops against my face, on my head and against my body but it doesn’t take long until I am not aware of the rain. Today I was doing an interval run so I warmed up for two miles on my way to the track. When I got on to the track my watch beeped triggering the increase of my pace for two miles. After two miles I would rest for 800 meters. During those 800 meters I would feel the water soaking through my sneakers and soaking the clothes that were sticking to me. I felt the residue of dirt on my shorts. I repeated these intervals two more times, two miles hard, 800 meters easy. Every time I burst into the faster portion of the run, I can’t help but feel a little more alive. There is an electricity that flows in me when I am running underneath a gray sky and I can’t even feel the rain splashing against me. The lack of sleep because of an orange faced moron won’t slow me down on this morning.
Its a reminder that my routine may be ordinary but with a little sweat and some rain — I am not ordinary, I am a badass.
